Social Workers at Human Development Now Earning More
Dolores Balderamos-Garcia
Social workers within the Ministry of Human Development are now earning salaries that are equal to their counterparts in the same field at other ministries and agencies. This comes after Cabinet approved the adjustment of their pay scales last week. Minister of Human Development, Dolores Balderamos-Garcia told News Five that the salaries for the roughly one hundred social workers in that ministry was an anomaly that was never addressed for well over a decade and it caused many good social workers to leave for better-paying jobs elsewhere.
Dolores Balderamos-Garcia, Minister of Human Development
“Sometimes they are up at midnight. Sometimes they have to accompany police in difficult situations. Sometimes we have to deal with placement of children who are in danger, which we have some cases of that right now. Sometimes we have to deal with difficult situations of mental illness and social workers many times go above and beyond the call of their duty. And I do want to place on record that we’re proud of the social workers of the Ministry of Human Development. And I can say that all of our staff are very, very pleased. And I want to thank cabinet colleagues that we were able to get this through.”
Marion Ali
“Does pay scale 16 put them on bar with the others?”
Dolores Balderamos-Garcia
“Yes. We have had very good people move to the UN, United Nations, and programs like UNICEF and UNDP, UNFPA, so I just want to make the point again, it’s a humble time for us, but also very proud because our social workers did not deserve to have been treated in a lesser manner than social workers every place else.”
Marion Ali
And so I would imagine that the increments, and salary increases will be on the same level as well. They will be moving at the same pace along with other government workers.
Dolores Balderamos-Garcia
“There is an agency in the Ministry of the Public Service called the Job Classification and Compensation Unit. And we are working closely with them now just to make all the adjustments so that, that can be rolled out in a good way.”
